FO
Forensic Files
HLN
Trial Verdict and Prison Life
From Death Play — Jun 18, 2026
Death Play — Jun 18, 2026 — starts at 0:00
Hey, this is Jonathan Fields, host of the Good Life Project So there's something about summer that hits different The backyard evenings that stretch past Glden hour, the citrus and salt smell of a road trip with the windows down The moments that feel like yours Pur's Summer Fragrance Collection is designed to bring those feelings home, literally Smart diffusers, clelean Sense controlled right from your phone It's a small thing that makes your space feel more like you. Visit pora. com to explore the summer collllection. Introducing the total Solutions advantage only from Comcast businessus. It's the largest, fastest fiber powered network for small business, gig speeds with equipment and security included, and a five year price lock No one does business like Ccast business Sich today? Get started for sixty dollars a month for twelve months when you add an advanced solution to a qualifying internet package. Limited time offer. restestrictions apply. N customers only. requires three hundred megabt per second interternet, securityedge and additionalifying service, one year agreement, paperless billing and autoay bank account requred. taxes and fees extra Your call has been forwarded to an automatic voice message system. Running a business means you're always reachable until you're not. and the moment you miss that call, a competitor picks it up That's why this episode is brought to you by Quo, spepelled QUO The business phone system built so you never miss an opportunity All your calls, texts, and voicemails live in one place. Anyone on your team can pick up a conversation, see the full history, and respond fast. Quo is the number one rated business phone system on G two, trusted by over ninety thousand businesses. Set up in minutes on any device. Keep your existing number, add teammates as you grow No IT, no hassle o's built in AI agent even handles after hours calls and books appointments. So you're covered around the clock Money is on the line Always say hello with Qo Try uo free, plus twenty percent off your first six months at cuo d. com slash tech. That's Quo d. com slash tech What you I During an evening church service, thirty eight year old Steve Robards fell ill died later that night of a heart attack One year later, while reading Hamlet, Steve Robard's daughter studied the lines of Claudius the King when he says the following about death, jealousy, guilt, and revenge My words fly up. My thoughts remain below Words without thoughts never to heaven go. In these words, a clue to her father's death The cities of Dallas and Fort Worth, Texas. Locals call it the Metroplex It's the largest consolidated metropolitan area in the state, known for the assassination of President John F. Kennedy in Deey Plaza in nineteen sixty three thirirty eight year old Steve Robards was a Texas native recently divorced and worked as a mail carrier for the United States Postal Service Ver proud of his job, which was just a rural route postman, but he liked his job He liked being outdoors And felt some pride in it His sixteen year old daughter, Marie had recently moved in with him after a disagreement she had with her mother's new husband. So they were living in a one bedroom apartment at this time and he was on the list to get the next available larger apartment He was very happy about having his daughter in his life at this point Marie enrolled in Eastern Hills High School, where she was a popular straight A student quQuiet, studious elegant K kind of girl, this sort of You looked at twice and always wanted to get to know because she seemed so reserved By all accounts, both father and daughter enjoyed living together, but their lives changed forever on the night of february seventeenth, nineteen ninety three youing Just after dinner Steve Robards attended an evening church service When he returned home He told his girlfriend and daughter he wasn't feeling well After a little while, he started getting stomach cramps, severe stomach cramps and they became more severe as the night progressed An any better?'s terrible. After a few hours, ultimately, nine hundred eleven was called and He went into what appeared to be a coma like state right there in the living room He began to foam at the mouth and became nauseous. And by the time the ambulance guys got there, He was dead An autopsy revealed The death was caused by cardiac arrest And I didn't want to believe how could it be that bad He was thirty eight. How How could it be that serious? His heart was mildly enlarged It was probably twenty five percent too heavy for a man, his age and size. And somewhat uncomfortably assigned it out as a natural death After Steve Robard's death Marie went to live with her grandparents and transferred to Mansfield High School for a new start So for one year, Marie lived the kind of perfect life every parent would hope their child She was an excellent student She never got in trouble She always turned in her homework She dated some, but she was never in any way regarded as a wild girl After graduation, Marie used the sixty thousand dollars she received from her father's life insurance policy to attend the University of Texas She majored in pre med. Her dream was to become a pathologist Midway through her freshman year Marie learned that police were investigating her father's death. They questioned how a thirty eight year old man could have died of a heart attack. So young It was by all accounts, the perfect crime Hey, this is Pablo from Pablo Torre findinds out and winning takes a team especially in business, like the Total Solutions advantage from Comcast Business. It's a winning team of features on the largest, fastest, fiber powered network Gig speeds with equipment and security included plus a five year price lock Learn more, get started for sixty dollars a month for twelve months when you add an advanced solution to a qualifying internet package Limited time offer, restrictions apply, new customers only, requires three hundred MBPS interternet, security edge, and additional qualifying service When you year agreement, paperless billing, and auto pay with bank account required taxes and fees, extra more at comcastbusiness dot comot Buying a car is a big deal, so you shouldn't go in blind. With the Car Gurus app, the new dealership mode is like having a personal cheat sheet in your pocket. Instantly compare the car in front of you to similar options, see deal ratings and price history, and estimate your final price. It's no wonder Car Gurus is the number one most visited car shopping site According to Similar Webbss estimated traffic data, buy or sell your next car today with cargurus at cargurus. com. Go to cargurus. com to make sure your big deal is the best deal. That's C ar gr Us. com cargurus. com We all belong outside We're drawn to nature. calluse to us Whether it's the recorded sounds of the ocean we doze off to or the succulents that adorn our homes. Nature makes all of our lives richer, calmer, and frankly Better Despite all this, we often go about our busy lives removed from it. But the outdoors is closer than we realize. With all trails, you can discover trails nearby or trails worth traveling to and explore confidently with offline maps and on trail navigation. whether you're looking for a laid back walk with family for something more adventurous to get your heart pumping. All Trails gives you the tools you need to get out there and find your outside Download the free app today and make the most of your summer with all trails. One second, you're enjoying your day off. The next, your phone buzzes. A window's been broken at home You're miles away. In one second, everything can change That's why ADT's professionally installed security systems monitor your home twenty forty seven. They're backed by the most company operated monitoring systems in the industry, so you're always supported during an emergency. When every second counts, count on ADT. Visit ADt. com to learn more A Steve Robard's unexpected death. His daughter Marie transferred to a new high school and made a new friend They see high I have to say we are best friends You know, we kind of fell in love with each other, you know, just it was We had so much in common. Stacy sees and Marie She sees something in Marie. She sees through her in a way She realizes that that poise and that perfection is disguising some During senior year, Stacy and Marie were both required to read Shakespeare's Hamlet for English class As they read the play together Stacey happened to begin with Claudius' soliloquy in A three, in which Claudius agonizes over his decision to repent for killing Hamlet's father. My fault is past. But o one of pr much You give me my foul murder That cannot be Since I'm still possessed of those effects for which I did the murder So Stacey reads the line and goes, isn't that cool Marie how that's written and Marie Sandy froz And tears begin to stream down her face. She asked me, Stacey, do you think people can go through life without a conscience? There was Stacey with her questions You have a secret Yes. You've done something? Yes. And you know, Stacey's first question, Oh my God, you're pregnant. Marie No, it's worse. So after a while guessing, I said, did you kill someone? She nodded her head, Yes And that's when Marie broke down and cried. I can't talk about this right now Marie then admitted The unthinkable that she murdered her own father She said she did it with the poison she stole from her chemistry class a year earlier Be Cful with this Marie said that she took the poison when the teacher's back was turned, placed it in a paper towel, and hid it in her backpack One week later, while preparing dinner, Marie mixed it into her father's Mexican food which concealed the taste of the poison The poison she used mimicked the signs of a heart attack, and her father died a few hours later The autopsy never detected the poison in his system. After the confession, Marie swore Stacy to secrecy If the pledge was broken, Stacey knew her best friend would spend the rest of her life in prison Stacy is tormented, however by the secret she too is trying to keep And she begins to have these nightmares. In one of these recurring nightmares, Stacey hears the voice of Marie's father Calling from the grave In another, Stacy sees Marie chasing her endlessly through the night She begins to lose her ability to focus. She can't concentrate in school. Her grades go down. She begins to drink too much at high school parties At one point, she asked her mother if she can check into a psychiatric hospital for adolescence And no one could figure out what had happened to Stacy. It seemed like the classic meltdown Stacey knew if she said anything, it would be her word against Marie's, since Steve Robard's death was ruled to be from natural causes However pressure on Stacy highigh was too great She told her mother, The school guidance counselor and eventually Police finally had to confess. Marie never would And like Claudius, she seemed stuck in her own private hell When Stacey Hde told police that Steve Robards had been poisoned, the police searched the chemistry lab where his daughter Marie said she stole the poison that killed him in the lab's safety manual A page describing the chemical Marie allegedly used had been torn out also tells you what precautions you need to take when using the substance. It also tells you what to do in case it's sallid or your eyes come in contact with it. If Marie used a poison to kill her father, why hadn't it shown up during the autopsy It's not a normal procedure unless there's some indication that we need to do then it's a testing that we don't do here at the facility and we have to send out far And the investigation did not lead us to suspect anything of that nature at the time of the death The chemicals she used, the only way it could be detected. As if The medical examiner in Fort Worth had a machine that cost one hundred fifty thousand dollars that could detect the trace of this chemical during an autopsy which they didn't have and which they never even thought of using. Technology which can find rare chemicals in human tissue is called a mass spectrometer gas chromatograph Since Marie planned to attend medical school and become a pathologist, prosecutors suspected she was familiar with the screening tests used by the local medical examiner She also knew which poison wouldn't be detected Investigators hope that Steve Robard's tissue samples were still in storage since his death eighteen months earlier The medical examiner's office was within days of destroying the tissue samples and the blood samples as they do when there's there's nothing amiss. They don't suspect foul play or homicide Tissue samples were sent to an independent forensic laboratory in Pennsylvania where they were analyzed with the mass spectrometer gas chromatograph Poison they were looking for was a metallic substance and very rare We will not reveal the name of the poison on this program The gas chromatograph mass spectrometer directs a beam of electrons on the sample, breaking its component molecules apart for analysis. The results are charted on a graph. Each peak is a separate compound The size of the peak is proportional to the amount present The number is the exact time and minutes it took for the compound to travel through the column from the moment of its injection to detection In Steve Robard's sample, scientists found a metallic compound with a retention time identical to the poison his daughter Marie admitted stealing from the chemistry lab And the amount found in Steve Robard's body was massive twentywenty eight times the lethal dose With this news Fort Worth Homicide Detective Thomas Bocher wentent to the University of Texas and Austin see, Marie Robarts She came out in the hallway and I introduced myself I told her she was under arrest for the death of her father, Stephven Robards years earlier She had no response There was no reaction Emarie quietly went with them poys as ever and once they got in that little room barely had to ask a question And she confessed and broke down And she was pretty forth forthcoming with information fairly quickly. She didn't tried to hide. She apparently was either guilt ridden or had thought a lot about what she had done and came forward with the information The most fascinating aspect for both the police and for journalists covering the case was Marie's explanation of her motive What was it that made you want to kill your father And she said I wanted to be with my mom But, in an ironic twist, like something out of a Shakespearean tragedy, it was all in vain because Marie Robard's mother and her new husband were planning to move to Florida and didn't tell her until after her father's funeral Marie had no choice but to move in with her grandparents so she could finish high school in Texas. And thus began this tale that in many ways is a kind of twisted modern parable of teenage girls in the suburbs. These girls that are have those mcurial emotions but also, many of whom are girls of divorce who are trying to grow up with parents. who have split up and seem often preoccupied with rebuilding their own lives and forget about the needs of their own children Despite her confession Marie Robard surprised everyone by deciding to plead not guilty She now said she hadn't planned to kill her father at all.
This excerpt was generated by Smart Features
Listen to Forensic Files in Podtastic
For listeners, not advertisers
All podcast names and trademarks are the property of their respective owners. Podcasts listed on Podtastic are publicly available shows distributed via RSS. Podtastic does not endorse nor is endorsed by any podcast or podcast creator listed in this directory.